Let us appoint a Minister for Circus Affairs

Rilwan

3 months ago

So, you see, this circus is well set up. What we need now is someone to direct it for us because it seems the clowns are weeping and the animals are beginning to get on each other and the poles are still short and the audience seems to be waiting and there is chaos everywhere and no one seems to be able to call anyone to order and …. Oh, what’s the point of it all?!

By now, you would have recovered somewhat from the news that has got all our mouths agape. I have not. I refer to the news, dear reader, that the Imo state governor, Rochas Okorocha, not content with building lifeless statues, has now appointed his sister, Mrs Ogechi Ololo, as, wait for it, the Commissioner of Happiness and Purpose Fulfilment. This means she will head a ministry of happiness. First of all, I am at a loss as to what that means exactly and how it can impact good governance. Will she be charged with dishing out happiness? Well, she should know right away I want a Jacuzzi.

I became even more worried when an assistant of the governor explained that critics of this genius move of his would soon be eating their hats when the fruits begin to come in. According to this brilliant mouthpiece, Gov. Okorocha is positively brimming with ideas, being a man of ideas, and his ‘ideas are like bullets. They pierce greatly.’ Wonderful. With ideas like that, who needs great ideas?

I thought that was bad enough. Then I heard during the week that another governor, Wike of Rivers State, has given sixteen jeeps to National Assembly members who come from Rivers State. Each vehicle, we are told, is valued at N45m only. Ladies and Gentlemen, do you remember the National Assembly members we are talking about? Do you remember that these are people whose remunerations far outweigh the carrying capacity of the country? So, believing they were not receiving enough, Gov. Wike goes and takes pity on their over-pampered estates by throwing into their pockets his own costly mites of jeeps. Where does he want them to put those jeeps in their compounds bursting with the stuff?

It’s not as if I’m complaining or anything; I’m just drawing attention to the whole setup of governance in Nigeria, and how our leaders are brimming with ideas that shoot through the air like bullets to help us. Did you say these are extremely poor ideas that should shoot through the owners’ feet? I would agree with you if I was just an observer. Sadly, I am not an observer since they are my countrymen.

It reminds me of a post in my phone in which someone had asked for help because a certain someone dressed in no recognisable fashion was a lawman in his country. There was an accompanying photo. Someone had replied him that he regretted he could not be of much help because someone dressed in the recognisable fashion of drug dealers with layers of neck chains and finger rings and bracelets was a governor in his own country. There was also an accompanying photo.

When I read these reports of what our governors were up to, I believed I should do a lot more than agree with someone’s opinion; so I went to a quiet corner and laughed my head off. It was important that no one should see me do it in public because then they would remind me, ‘this is no laughing matter.’ As if I didn’t know. I know it’s a lot more; it is a veritable circus show! I tell you, it is a happiness show!! Gov. Okorocha is right; we do need a director for this great national circus!!!

Where else but a circus will you find a governor erecting statues of his foreign cronies in his state but in Nigeria? Oh yes, it happened in Gov. Okorocha’s Imo State. By the way, I saw the post of the statue pulled down with its face downwards. When I saw the post, I understood the meaning of the phrase, ‘biting the dust’. I really did wonder what took the people of the state so long that they actually allowed the statue to stand there looking at them for more than a day. I hear the governor has promised to build more statues. Hmm. Perhaps this purpose will be fulfilled on the heels of the appointment of his sister to express his happiness.

In this same national circus, we have another governor who is well renowned for refusing to pay his workers’ salaries, for which reason people are dying. However, I hear he has assured the whole country not to worry about his re-election. He would return, he has been heard to boast, by the power of his guns and millions. I also heard that he had a trial run of this tactic at a governorship election recently where he showed those millions. I’m not sure but I think people said his millions lost, as did his party.

Anyway, it seems to be clear that governance has become a show in Nigeria; a circus show. The leaders are no longer content with swilling champagne in the mornings, riding in their heavily tinted jeeps and making ordinary people trot alongside them, or scattering the institutions they meet on ground while building nothing. No sir; now they want more. They want to be thoroughbred clowns, tightrope walkers, fire-ring jumpers, lion tamers and commanders, elephant riders and pole gymnasts. So, you see, this circus is well set up. What we need now is someone to direct it for us because it seems the clowns are weeping and the animals are beginning to get on each other and the poles are still short and there is chaos everywhere and the audience seems to be waiting and no one seems to be able to call anyone to order and…. Oh, what’s the point of it all?!

The unfortunate thing is that the audience, when not wracked with laughter, are also helpless. Since they have only come to gaze at the animals, they do not believe they should help them. Clearly, the animals are in trouble, but who is to say? Who will impose the needed order? We need order here, and fast. When a happiness ministry is being created for a land full of hungry people, there is definitely a problem. What are we going to discuss in that ministry? Will it also have directors? Perhaps, we will have a director of goals, director of smiles, director of cleanliness, director of sorrow banishment… What exactly? Where exactly does addressing hunger come into the picture?

There is a quote that says if you can still keep your head in the midst of this confusion, then you do not understand the problem. Now think of the reverse. If you have lost your head in the midst of this confusion, then the problem has clearly overwhelmed you. It would be a lot better for those who have lost their heads to run away from leadership positions. Unfortunately, that will describe over half of Nigerians. I think the country will be the better for it if that number will just take a simple bow and go sit in the side lines. Then we will recognise them easily enough as the ones who have lost their heads.

When we have a Minister for Circus Affairs, his/her job will be to continually sieve the people to know who to throw on which side. I think I will like to be thrown on a nice cushy seat at the back in the shade from where I can watch ideas whiz past the leaders’ heads, like bullets. I suspect it looks a lot like what I am already doing; but what do I know?